Digitalis Kid O.D.
Location: Windham, Connecticut Date: December 4, 1986 Story On December 4, 1986, Sarah Bedore and her family in Windham, Connecticut, discovered the dangers of leaving a child alone, even briefly, when medicine is left in an easily accessible place. "I was babysitting for my granddaughter, Sharelle, while her mother, and my daughter, Pam, was in the hospital having another baby," Sarah said, recounting the event. "I thought this would be great, because I could have fun with her." Sarah shared the house where 2-year-old Sharelle DiRenzo was visiting her with her 82-year-old mother, Mary, who was nearly blind and suffered from a heart condition. She was taking Digoxin, a prescription drug that increased the force of her heartbeat. Because of her severe vision impairment, the medication was normally left out on the kitchen table where anyone could easily find it. "I had left Sharelle in the living room playing, and had gone upstairs for a few minutes to get dressed," Sarah recalled. When she came back downstairs, she found Mary holding Sharelle, who was over the kitchen sink and vomiting. "Mom, what happened?" she asked in alarm. "Sharelle's sick," Mary replied. "I couldn't tell what the problem was at that time," said Sarah, who brought Sharelle back into the living room and had her lie down on the couch. "I thought it was a touch of the flu coming on." When Sarah went back into the kitchen to get some water for Sharelle, she noticed for the first time that the top was off the container that held the Digoxin tablets, and they were strewn across the counter. She then realized that Sharelle must have swallowed some of the highly potent medicine. At that point, Sarah called her other daughter, Cheryl, who worked just down the street. "My mother said, 'Sharelle has gotten into Gram's heart medication. She's vomiting. Come now.' I replied that I'd be right there. My heart was pounding because I knew Sharelle was a little girl, and that my grandmother's medication was rather serious because of her heart problems. When I arrived, we didn't know how many tablets she had swallowed. I started talking to her immediately, and kept trying to get her to tell me what exactly she had done. She just kept repeating, 'I took my medicine,'" said Cheryl. Sharelle was still vomiting and registering a very low pulse. They realized that it would be quickest to drive the 5 miles to the nearest hospital. "I learned that getting Sharelle to the nearest hospital was the most important thing," said Cheryl. They got her to Windham Community Hospital within 10 minutes, and told the emergency room staff that she had taken Mary's heart medication about 45 minutes earlier. Herb Grey, the doctor in charge of the emergency room, described the situation: "The first thing we wanted to do was to get her on a cardiac monitor to determine if she had any apparent serious rhythm disturbance. The problem with Digoxin is that it can have profound effects on the heart, including slowing of the heart or even cardiac arrest." By the time they got Sharelle on the monitor, the time release medication was starting to take effect. Her heartbeat was slowly being suppressed. It was critical that they find out as soon as possible just how much of the drug had gotten into her system. "The blood tests that we obtained showed that she had indeed ingested Digoxin, and that her levels were four to five times about what would be considered toxic," said Dr. Grey. In an attempt to lower the levels of the drug in Sharelle's system, she was given a special mixture of activated charcoal. "It's a special mixture of treated charcoal that binds chemicals in the gastrointestinal tract and therefore prevents them from being absorbed into the bloodstream," Dr. Grey explained. Some of the mixture stayed in Sharelle's stomach for 3 to 4 minutes, but then she vomited most of it up, so it did not remain in her system long enough to have the desired effect. Sharelle's condition continued to deteriorate. To Cheryl's and Sarah's increasing distress, she seemed to show no signs of improvement. "Watching the heart monitor and watching her blood pressure going up and down, I became more and more anxious, because I knew whatever it was that we were doing wasn't enough," said Cheryl. The decision was made to transfer Sharelle to Hartford Hospital's pediatric cardiology unit. "When they actually had her packaged up on the stretcher and the Lifestar door was open, and they put her into the helicopter and closed the door, I thought I wouldn't see her alive again," Cheryl said. Pam's husband, Ron, was contacted at work and told of her serious condition. "I don't know how I got from work to Hartford to see my daughter," he said. "I don't even remember half of the driving--I was just going. Too many things were going through my head. I just couldn't believe that this was actually happening, and thought I was going to wake up and discover that this was all just a bad dream. Lifestar was landing in the parking lot as I came in. I tried to get to the helicopter, but security wouldn't let me anywhere near it. I saw them take her out on a stretcher, and then it hit me that she was in really rough shape and in a fight for her life. I was yelling and screaming, calling for my daughter, just calling out, 'Sharelle, Daddy loves you. Please don't leave me.'" Ron managed to get through to Pam at another hospital, where she had just delivered a baby boy that was later named Nicholas. "He told me that something had happened to our daughter, that she had taken Grandma's heart medication," Pam said. "That's when I asked him, 'Is she dead or alive?' And he said, 'Right now she's alive, but we don't know if she's going to make it or not.' At that point I thought I had just given birth to one child, and that my other child was being taken away from me." Cheryl went to the hospital to comfort Pam. "She looked up when I came through the door and began to cry," said Cheryl. "I just went over to her, held her, and said, 'Pam, she's going to be okay, she's going to be all right.' But none of us knew if she was of if she wasn't." Back at Hartford Hospital, the levels of the drug in Sharelle's bloodstream increased with each passing hour, but there was nothing more they could do. Unless the drug's levels became lethal, an antidote itself could be toxic. "I was just watching her with all that equipment--watching her heartbeat on the screen, praying that she wouldn't leave us, and wondering what I would do to myself for not having spent the time that I should have with my daughter," Ron said. Then, sometime later in the night, the levels of the drug in Sharelle's blood finally peaked, and it was clear that they would not need to use the antidote. "It was about 2 in the morning when the nurse came and told me that I could go in and see my daughter," Ron said. "They didn't have to tell me twice--I was gone. I stayed at her bedside with her for quite a while. Finally, she sat up, she took a drink of ginger ale for me, and we held each other for a while. She gave me a pretty big hug for a little kid." Ron brought the good news to Pam, but it was 2 days before she was able to see Sharelle. "She looked weak," Pam said. "And as soon as she saw me, she had a big smile on her face. She said, 'Mommy,' and put her arms out for a hug, and I went over and gave her a big hug, and cried." Four years later, Sharelle had no permanent after effects from the accidental overdose that nearly took her life. "Looking at her today, you wouldn't know that anything ever happened," Ron says. "She's healthy, active--you can't keep her down. She's just one bouncing beautiful girl." "There are times when she may be sleeping in bed at night, and I just think back on the accident, and then I'll go in bed and lie next to her and rub her, just happy that she is with us today," Pam says. "When the grandchildren come to visit, grandparents are not always aware of what may be of danger to children," Sarah says. "Not having children around, it's easy to forget that children are inquisitive and are going to touch things that they can't touch." "Consider the fact that you have a lot of poisons that you normally use in your day-to-day activities," says Dr. Grey, "mostly cleaning solutions that will be under the sink in your kitchen or under the sink in the bathroom, both areas that are readily accessible to a toddler, someone who's exploring their world." "God didn't want her right now, and apparently she wasn't ready to go," said Pam. "To me, she is my miracle child. She has a long life ahead of her to live yet." Category:1986 Category:Connecticut Category:Poisonings